mrlewish:Might have something to do with the fact that coffee use increases on average the higher a families income. Guess what? richer families have better health insurance.

Of course not. Experienced epidemiologists never think of those kind of things. Especially the tobacco use thing, because nobody at the American Cancer Society is aware that tobacco might influence cancer rates. Fortunately, they are obvious to Random Internet Guy, who is here to point them out.

FTFA: Lead author Janet Hildebrand, an epidemiologist and population expert with the American Cancer Society, and colleagues analyzed coffee and tea consumption among people enrolled in the Cancer Prevention Study II, a study begun in 1982 by the American Cancer Society....No significant link was found for decaffeinated coffee, and no link at all for tea, the study said.

So is your hypothesis that drinking caffeinated coffee is correlated with higher income, but decaf and tea are not? Or that caffeinated coffee drinkers smoke and drink less than decaf and tea drinkers?

correlation does not equal causation.

Using this expression has rapidly become a badge of stupidity -- and not just any kind of stupidity, but that special kind of stupidity that thinks it is smart.